Kmcalpin

Thats only part of it. A youngster contemplating signing for United should know that he'll face stiff competition from many, many cohorts if he wants to make it at Tannadice. Spiderpig is correct - they throw a lot of money at it and they'll pay for the best prospects. Their set up is really quite mercenary, but it has worked.

Exactly. McManus is the whipping boy for many just now, and yes he isn't playing well. However the amount of freedom we offer to teams to fire in crosses in absolutely criminal. Cut out the avoidable crosses and corners and our goals against tally will drop drastically. By contrast our opponents, more often than not, fight like men possessed to prevent us from getting anywhere near the point of firing in decent crosses.

Yes and they're usually ushered out of the door PDQ.

Did your colleague elaborate on that? What did he mean? Is it the case that A) the players support Bara's methods but are finding hard to understand them or implement them or B) are wilfully resisting change and are being thrawn. The boss is in charge end of. In Jim Gannon's stint, it was a case of both. He upset a number of the pros, some of whom got on with it while others downed tools. As far as his tactics were concerned they were spot on in principle. However the players he had at his disposal were not good enough to understand or implement them. He was so inflexible he couldn't adjust his approach. At the end of the day MFC pays the players wages and in return the club as an employer has every right to expect them to try their best.

+1 I was expecting a mid table finish this year given our failure to clear out an ineffectual central midfield. On paper the squad looked good enough for 5/6/7 th spot.

I'm surprised that no-one has questioned whether O'Brien will be fit or not. If he isn't then, the central defence will have to comprise McManus and one of Kerr, Ramsden or Cummins. Thats worrying. Apologies I forgot that O'Brien is suspended. Still he probably wouldn't have been fit anyway.

Bang on the money. Yet a lot of folk say we've been lucky this season to pick up the points we have.

Points accumulated to date will count towards the end of season tally. At the end of the day points will decide which team stay up, which faces a play off and which is relegated. The footballing authorities will not take into account a team's popularity or how well they're perceived to have played. The 2 teams below us are below us for a reason. We have had to contend with a horrendous injury list all season. All that said, yes we are a poor team.

Just watched the TV footage. Who was playing right back - they had little cover admittedly but dearie me they had a real nightmare. Crosses were conceded far too cheaply - the first goal being a classic example. At the first goal the crosser had all the time and space in the world to pick out Van Dijk, who lets not forget is 6'4". Its not rocket science to prevent the ball from getting anywhere near him at crosses/set pieces.

Thats it. We also have to pick up good young players. In the last few years our young lads just haven't been good enough and no amount of coaching can disguise that fact.

Really? If we stay up it'll because we finish 10th. If the 12th and possibly 11th teams go down it'll be because they deserved to. It sounds like you want us to go down.

Agree Alan. St Mirren are still 2 points behind us with a game more played. They've still to play Celtic before the split we don't. Hopefully we'll see some chages in personnel next week. Is it any wonder the players are showing a lack of fight when fans are so pessimistic? Feeding off each other guess? Yes, we've got a helluva fight on our hands but we are above both both St Mirren and Ross County. When did St Mirren last win a home game?

Can you post the full article please? I can't access it. Certainly its a high risk option but fortunately we're not involved.

I think he injured his groin against Stjarnan and this rumbled on for months. Suspect it was a hernia. He then had an operation a month or two back. The question is why didn't he have an operation (or elective procedure in medical mumbo jumbo) earlier in the season.

Good news indeed.

Its encouraging to see us linked with some fresh players. Despite signing Pearo again I'd still like to see us sign a defensive midfielder to play in the middle. We need a complete overhaul of our midfield and it seems Ian Baraclough has cottoned on to our structural weakness there.

I think it was the storm force winds earlier in the week that caused the damage. They really were destructive. In short you are saying that you simply don't believe Alan Marshall and the club?

Panels could be dislodged by a sudden freak gust of wind, vibration, frost damage or even the ball canoning off the panels. To play the game in such circumstances would be reckless in the extreme. Any player standing in the vicinity of a falling panel could be decapitated. Simply not worth the risk.

Dan doesn't have a great defence in front of him granted, but his biggest problem is his midfield and in particular his central midfield who leave him and the defence far too exposed.

No Howard Sameroff didn't play many games - the odd one as a stop gap. Ally Maxwell was never very impressive either until his later days with us - we never thought he was going to make it.

I've no problem whatsoever with folk raising concerns about what has gone wrong/what is going wrong, Alan. What I don't think is particulalrly helpful is immediately looking for someone to blame. Too often these days, and not just in football, when things go wrong the first comment some people utter is "heads must roll". I'm sure most of us have been the victim of such thinking or comments at work at some point. Much more positive and sensible is to analyse what has gone wrong and how to put it right as quickly as possible.

Its the time honoured and trusted method of managing matters when things go wrong isn't it? In times of trouble or crisis the first and most important question to ask "Who is to blame?"

X2 A bit part player.

In the main thats about right. What happened to the extra revenue fans were promising if we voted against Rangers' fast tracking and for sporting integrity? Cup results have been a disaster.

Dundee United will be paying him until the end of the season I'd guess or will make up for any loss in earnings. Basically they just want him out of the door.